Kerosene
by Vermillion Dragonfly
Summary: he's got the kerosene and a desire, he's trying to start a flame in the heart of the night. TT.
1. Rain is Coming Down

Kerosene

* * *

"This doesn't feel right..."

It was funny how the one with _invulnerability_ was talking about _feeling._

"It's your first time on the job, of course it doesn't."

Michael took a deep breath. They didn't call Chunhua Song the _Ice Queen_ for nothing. Though she could get rather fiery in battle, outside his partner was composed and cool, just like the cold that she so easily manipulated.

She'd been doing this ever since she was a child. She had no problem with any of it, did she? Well, he did. His hesitance didn't go unnoticed, however.

Noticing that he was lagging behind by a few feet, Chunhua whipped around to face him. "For Charon," She then grabbed onto his wrist and dragged him along.

'_For Charon…'_ He thought, a greasy uneasiness settling into his stomach. Right, because the new law established would protect everyone. The government was a joke. Of course, Michael was careful what he said around Chunhua, what with her brother being in the highest rungs. He did suppose he had nowhere else to go, unless you counted a cemetery.

The duo approached a house located in the middle of a cul-de-sac. The two were clothed in black; the darkness of the night concealing each of them. The neighborhood was tranquil, and Michael felt awful that he had to break the serenity. He watched with a disconnected sense of being as Chunhua froze the window with a simple touch, able to shatter it easily. She hopped through the window, beckoning him to follow.

'_For Charon…_' Became his mental mantra, but for some reason he could not shake the feeling that this wasn't for the good of the city, but rather for the good of the few political elites at the top. He really wished he knew more about the political system, but when your family is starving you've got better things to think about.

He took a deep breath as he jumped through the window, the broken ice shards scraping his skin. The government had done a wonderful job at refining his invulnerability; he hardly felt a thing anymore. He glanced at his hand – no blood. The home hardly looked hostile, save for the creepy taxidermy ravens they had sitting on the windowsill. This place looked a lot safer than his own home had been. He swallowed, feeling guilty for breaking that sense of security. He knew what that felt like.

The slight sound of creaking brought his attention to reality. Chunhua was gracefully ascending up the staircase. Another deep breath. The mantra ceaseless in his head, he carefully climbed up the staircase as well. His hands started to shake as Chunhua silently began checking rooms. Oh God, she was really going to do it. He was really going to do this. They were really going to do this, and no one would ever think twice about –

_Shit._

There he went, tumbling down the stairs. His partner turned to glare murder at him, not bothering to help him. Of course not; it's not like he could die anyway. Getting back up with a slight groan nonetheless, a voice ripped through the broken silence.

"Who's there?!" Panicked, alert…scared. The voice made him wince.

Chunhua was going to kill him – if she ever could, anyway. Michael scrambled to the top of the staircase once more as the Chinese girl disappeared from his sight.

There was a sudden burst of cold emanating from the room down the hall, and he knew that was where she had gone to. As he approached the room, however, a sudden burst of flames streamed out from it. Right, the target's power was pyrokinesis. That had been why Chunhua, government purebred, had needed a partner. She didn't do well in heat.

"Agen - Chunhua!" He called, charging into the flames heedlessly. He twitched as he felt himself burning – though he knew it was at a much lesser extent to what Chunhua must be feeling. As the flamethrower died down, he stood in the doorway, too confused over his morals to do anything. The target – Giselle, he remembered, and Chunhua, were fighting. Judging by Giselle's expression, she hardly wanted anything to do with violence.

He noted that Chunhua was relying mostly on her karate skills; the room being too hot to generate any sort of ice. He guessed that Giselle's fear and confusion was fueling her fire manipulation. His partner closed in on the girl, wiping sweat away from her brow as she aimed a kick at the girl's neck. Giselle in response, merely blocked herself, her arms on fire. Though Chunhua's leg broke through her measly block and knocked Giselle down, the direct contact with fire made the ice princess cry out in pain. She bounced back, holding onto her leg. Despite the inflammable clothing, the proximity to heat had burned her leg anyway.

Placing her foot down, he watched Chunhua's expression contort as her weight shifted to avoid further strain. She soon became too busy to address him as Giselle created a wall of fire to separate herself from Chunhua.

"I swear I haven't done anything bad," Giselle cried, "I _swear_! Please leave me alone!"

Michael knew she was telling the truth. She was targeted because she was the only one who survived in a classroom fire, letting the government know she had potential. She was being targeted because her parents refused to hand her over to the government; because she refused to join their ranks after her parents _mysteriously_ disappeared. And that made her a rebel. And _that_ made her dangerous.

Chunhua was deaf to her begging, however. With a burst of adrenaline, Michael assumed, she covered herself with ice and ran through the wall of fire, kicking the back of Giselle's knee to make her balance teeter. As the girl fell, the karate expert grabbed onto Giselle's head and smashed it into a glass cabinet that had held all sorts of crystal figurines. Michael hoped that would knock the girl out. It didn't.

Giselle whipped around, her fist aflame as she smacked Chunhua straight in the face. "Leave me _ALONE!_" She screamed, a horrified expression falling over her face as the cyrokinetic dropped to the ground. No one ever got the privilege of beating Chunhua, but Giselle had an elemental advantage. Besides, people could get tough as hell when scared out of their minds.

Giselle looked at him, blood running down her forehead. Sweeping her bloodied bangs out of her eyes, she took a deep breath and poised herself as he approached. She would be easy for him to take out; her flames caused nothing but discomfort and the slightest tremor of pain to him.

"Leave." His own voice was shaky, so he took a moment to fortify himself. Then, he said in an authoritative voice, "Run away." She looked confused, so he repeated, "_Leave,_ now!"

He kneeled down to pick up Chunhua as he watched Giselle flee, the flames dying in her wake.

* * *

"Target 9160 status: deceased."

"Excellent, Agent Lester," Tradi stated, collecting the paperwork Michael had since prepared. It took all of his willpower to stay strong in the presence of Tradi Sfiducia. He was the boss, after all, and intimidated in ways he didn't even think was possible. "You will be given your next mission shortly. Until then, you are dismissed."

Swallowing, Michael nodded and turned on his heel, walking briskly away. He made a beeline to the infirmary. Like always, Dr. Kirswell was there, hitting on his nurse. Aiyana and Blair were practically married as he saw it; he didn't know they didn't just get on with it.

Rolling his eyes, he approached the couple. "Hey, Dr. Kirswell -"

"Agent Lester!" Dr. Kirswell greeted him politely, holding out his hand. Michael shook it with slight confusion, as the doctor stated, "Heard you eliminated 9160. Nice work!"

'_How the hell does he know already?'_ Michael wondered, but brushed it aside as the healer continued.

"Agent Song has been asking for you."

"She's awake?"

"Yes," It was Chunhua's voice. He followed her voice, "Yes, I'm awake." She rolled her eyes at him and said, "Don't give me that look. I've been through worse." She did look pretty bad – though her bandages covered most of her burnt skin. When he had first brought her to the infirmary, all of that had been exposed and looked awful.

"I hear you killed 9160."

He guessed that the targets had numbers to dehumanize them. He guessed it wouldn't be that hurt to exterminate something if you thought of it as a numbered bullseyes. "Yeah…I thought you had it under control until you got knocked out," He said quietly, sitting down beside her. Luckily, she didn't sense he was lying. He was afraid she would have; after all, they had gone through some before-mission training together.

"I can't believe you did it," She said suddenly, and Michael's heart froze mid-beat. Then, she looked to him as she smiled, "I'm proud of you. You've come a long way, Michael." He smiled back, looking down at the floor. "You did the right thing, you know. Charon is safer now."

'_You're being brainwashed, Chunhua,' _He thought. Yet, his response was, "Yeah, I know."

He felt nothing, and for the one with invulnerability, that was just a little bit strange.


	2. We're On the Run

Kerosene

Michael had been feeling sick all day. It was the kind of sickness where you felt your innards tighten and lace with anxiety. It was an awful feeling. Tradi was prompt with his next mission, and the target could not have been anyone worse.

Finnegan Murphy, aka his best friend for about a decade. They'd met during recess of sixth grade, and one revolutionary game of Beyblade had kickstarted it all. Michael lost contact with him after he lost his family and started this whole business. But now, he was the next target. The brunette always knew that his ginger friend has some sort of special ability; the way he could understand … well, just about _anything_ was nothing short of supernatural.

That, combined with the sinking feeling he was doing something morally injust in the first place was where Michael wanted to draw the line. He wanted to go over to the bedridden Chunhua, take her by the shoulders and just shake her back into reality. He knew it wouldn't work, but he just couldn't stage a revolution if she wasn't on his side. He couldn't fight her. Not to mention, starting a revolution was a pretty bold idea. He didn't have the guts for it. He had gained a reputation for being a _weiner_ during training.

He was now assigned to kill his longtime best friend. If the situation didn't sound shitty enough, his partner was _the_ government top agent. Oh yes, Chunhua was something. But Jae-Jun Han was something else entirely. Either Tradi had been so impressed with Michael's performance that he got the honor of having Jun as a partner, or Finn was really damn dangerous.

The invulnerable man followed his golden-haired partner, slinking towards the Irish Pub Finn was told to occupy. So he'd turned into a big drinker after all? They'd always taken bets on if that was going to come true.

"You owe me fifty…" Michael murmured under his breath, causing Jun to turn around. A handgun appeared in his hand as he pointed it at Michael's forehead.

"I owe you a .50 caliber shot to the forehead?" Jun asked, and the brunette stared at him, slowing shaking his head. Yeah, sure, a shot to the head wouldn't necessarily kill him, but no one had ever shot him at point-blank range before. Michael was confident in his invulnerability, but not confident enough to say that a shot from that gun wouldn't knock him out for a while, or kill him. Jun shook his head and placed the gun in his holster. "You need to be focused, Agent Lester."

The Jun's plan was simple. Go into the bar, stalk Finn and hire a pretty lady to get him more drunk than his Irish self could tolerate (Why didn't Tradi just assign a female to this mission? Who knows) and then on his way stumbling drunk home, kill him. Blame a few thugs, alleviate any suspicion towards the government, bang bang boom. Simple.

Michael's version of the plan was different. Right now, he was wearing a hood that shadowed his face very well. His plan was to slip Finn a warning notice. He'd recognize the handwriting. Was it the most well-thought out plan? No, but he never claimed to be a tactical genius. Especially not under these circumstances. Hands stuffed in his pockets, Jun opened the door.

It was a normal pub. Nothing seemed to be out of place, but Jun was attentive, a hand ready at his holster. The two sat at the bar, and annoyingly enough only Michael had to be ID'd. The bartender either didn't care about Jun's age, or Jun didn't look under 21. Which Michael thought was funny, because he definitely did. Maybe it was the Asianness. He swore, all Asians at any point in their life appeared to be 15.

They spotted Finn a few seats over in the bar, sitting next to a very loud emerald-haired girl. Hm, he didn't recognize her. It didn't appear that Finn and the grass-haired girl were related, however, since the ginger was ignoring her. Almost on purpose, it seemed.

"Go ask her to buy Target 10008 a few drinks," Jun commanded, and Michael gulped. God, he hoped he could pull off a Darth Vader voice. Or at least, hoped Finn wasn't paying attention enough to recognize his voice.

Michael couldn't refuse the command of a top-notch government agent. He still had a façade to keep up. Actually, maybe this would be better, if he could talk to Finn now without Jun hearing. He approached the green-haired girl and gently tapped her on the shoulder.

"Ma'am, might I ask you a favor?" He started silently, wishing to strike up conversation to make it look like he was doing what Jun told him to do. "Would you mind ordering that man rig-"

"YOU!" The girl shouted, suddenly jumping out of her seat. Finn slammed his head into the bar. "You hoodlum! Are you trying to interfere with this innocent young civilian's ability to be inebriated? Well, I shall not have it!"

Over her loud speech, one could hear Finn mumbling, "Rita, stop…Please stop…Ritaaaa…"

But she didn't listen. "You are trying to meddle with the perfectly fine people at this Irish pub institution and although I am not Irish I might as well be because I have that good old Irish fighting spirit! I am the Three-Hit Wonder, Rita Faulkner! HIIIIYAH!" The girl did something unexpected.

She punched him square in the face, causing him to fall flat on his back. What the _hell_ is her problem? Unfortunately, his hood fell down in the process. Holy shit, that was _not_ the way he wanted this to go. As he sat up, he realized Finn was staring at him. Dammit. He'd been found out. It was even worse since the pub was dead silent. Rita had quite an abrasive personality. She certainly never wanted to be forgotten.

"Michael…?" Finn asked, his eyebrows knitting together. He could _feel_ Jun's eyes burning holes right through him. Shit. Damn. What was that one word Finn told him once? Oh yeah. _Malarkey. _

"Hey…Finn," He took Finn's hand as he helped him up. Michael gave him a nice bro-hug, and as they embraced (in the most masculine way possible), he whispered, "Run." It was a lot like the other day with Giselle and Chunhua. Except for the fact that Jun knew that Michael was a liar. It was something Chunhua may've let him get away with, thinking that maybe their pre-established relationship would allow for an easier killing. Chunhua would've had faith in him.

But Jun was not Chunhua. And so, it was to be expected that the night would not unfold like Michael had idealized.

His ears were filled with shrieking before he felt something penetrate and crack his skull. A curtain of black descended into his vision as he dropped to the floor like a weight of lead.


End file.
